According to official statistics from the Central Registry of Drug Abuse, the number of reported abusers under the age of 21 has increased by 18% to 2729 last year. This shows that more and more young people are abusing drugs and the problem of drug abuse among school students are getting more and more serious. This criminal act does not only harm the health of the abusers but also triggers many other crimes such as robberies, thefts, violence or even murders. In response to the problem, a voluntary drug testing scheme will be held. However, the measure is definitely not tough enough, thus, not effective enough to tackle the problem.
In the first place, the test was not made compulsory; students can refuse to take the test. One of the purposes of imposing this scheme is to find out the drug abusers and then to offer them help. Just imagine, if you are an abuser, and you can choose not to join this scheme, will you volunteer to take the test, and show other people you are a drug-taker? I doubt you will. Therefore, there is not any hope to find any drug abusers through this scheme, since no one will surrender themselves. At the same time, one cannot assume all those who refused to take the test are drug abusers, because of their disapproving attitude to their scheme. Thus, the scheme will be a vain attempt to tackle the problem.
On top of this, the report of drug abusers to police was not made compulsory, even if the scheme manages to discover some drug abuser, their school can choose not to report them and privately give them a chance, or chances. Honestly speaking, only a few teachers will report their students because, firstly, they believe their students will change and then stay away from drugs. Secondly, they are afraid their reports will affect the student-teacher relation. Thirdly, they are afraid the reports will affect the school reputation. Fourthly, they are afraid of receiving complaints from parents of the abusers. If the school does not report their drug-taking students to the police, the scheme will be useless. Moreover, drug-taking is a criminal offense. When schools are allowed not to report, it sends a wrong message to society that this criminal act is tolerable, thus the deterring effect of the scheme would be greatly reduced. Therefore, the scheme cannot stop students from crossing the wrong, noxious line.
More importantly, the scheme excludes police participation. The scheme is carried out by a team of two nurses and two social workers who will visit the schools twice a month, none of them carries a deterring image. Moreover, drug abuse is not the sole problem society is now facing, there are also other drug-related problems. In some senses, drug dealers are even more horrible and dangerous than drug abusers, because they will distribute drugs to their schoolmates thus make a large sum of money as their schoolmates become addicted. They will also recruit other drug dealers without fear of police intervention. Such as illegal activities will be difficult to track down. In other words, the scheme is merely window dressing which cannot serve to solve the problem.
In conclusion, since the drug test was not made compulsory, the report of drug abusers to the police was not made compulsory, and the scheme excludes police intervention, the scheme is a futile attempt to solve the problem.